<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Certainty by Tafka</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26343079">Certainty</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tafka/pseuds/Tafka'>Tafka</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Dragon Age - All Media Types</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/M</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 03:41:25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>683</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26343079</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tafka/pseuds/Tafka</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Andraste is filled with the certainty of the Maker. Shartan has doubts.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Andraste/Shartan</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Black Emporium 2020</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Certainty</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/barbex/gifts">barbex</a>.</li>



    </ul></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>There were precious few quiet moments, but the ones they had together, she always cherished.</p><p>Shartan, once her Champion, now also her lover, sat beside their fire and lost himself, deep in thoughts. Andraste was familiar with this state, being often in it herself. It was how she could feel the Maker’s Will, emanating from the core of her being, bubbling up through her body in song. Shartan was not filled with song now. It seemed a darker spirit had caught his mind, as he gazed into the flames, his face crossed with shadow and his limbs slack. The only movement visible was the small twitch of his thumb where he drew it across the hilt of his sword Glandivalis. </p><p>She did not need to ask what thoughts went through his mind as he seemed so far away, perhaps even as far away as Val Dorma. Similar thoughts of the past often captured her own mind, although for her they were always swiftly replaced by certainty. The Maker’s Will, she named it, or it had named itself, (the cause was less important than the effect.) Sometimes she wished for Shartan that he could be filled with the same conviction in the success of their campaign. She knew he shared her knowledge of the rightness of it.</p><p>Siently, she came to sit beside him, near but not touching, hoping her presence could bring some amount of peace to him. His hand drifted from Glandivalis to her knee, and rested there, thumb still tracing small circles. These small intimacies were like a balm to Andraste’s soul, and she was certain Shartan felt the same way. Not the certainty that came from the Maker, but one that came from her own observation and every small hint of emotion in his face.</p><p>After a few moments, he spoke, “Something about this coming battle does not sit right with me.” </p><p>She nodded, but did not understand. She knew they would prevail in battle just as they had for every battle they fought before. Their cause was just, and they had the Maker on their side. Sometimes she felt that Shartan did not trust in the Maker as she did, but she knew that he trusted in her, which was as much the same thing. “I know with you by my side, love, there is no force in this world that can stop us.”</p><p>He smiled at her, but the expression did not reach his eyes. “If our love was enough to win a war, Tevinter would already lay smouldering under our feet.”</p><p>“True,” she allowed, “but even the inevitable takes time. I know it is the Maker’s Will that we--”</p><p>“Enough of the Maker’s Will, Andraste!” he cried, “Was all the suffering and torture that I have suffered at the hands of the Magisters the Maker’s Will?”</p><p>She cast her eyes down, and did not respond to him. He did not know how his doubt could hurt her. In his pain, he did not remember that she had also been enslaved by the Magisters, although not for as long as he had, it was true. She also had no answer for his question. For all that the Maker gave her the knowledge of righteousness, He was silent on this matter. “I do not know,” she admitted quietly. It is something that she would only confide in Shartan. It was not that she doubted, it was that there were some things she could not understand, and she accepted that. She did know that she could not ask Shartan to have the same acceptance that she did.</p><p>“I apologize, that was unfair of me,” he said.</p><p>“No, it was more than fair,” she replied, “I should never want you to feel that you could not question me, or the Maker. I should never want that of anyone.”</p><p>“I know,” he reached out to hold her face in his palm, and this time when he smiled there was no sadness behind it.</p><p>She kissed his hand, and felt secure in both the warmth of his love, and the certainty of it.</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
</html>